An Evaluation of Wetting Front in Subsurface and Surface Drip Irrigation in Laboratory Experiment

In this research, surface and subsurface drip irrigation system performance was evaluated with considering the moisture front and water distribution on light, medium and heavy homogeneoustextured soils. Experiments were carried out in a plexiglasslysimeter container with transparent walls. Emitters were buried at 15, 30 and 45 cm depths with discharge rates of 2.4, 4 and 6 L/h. Observations of wetting bulb dimensions showed that water moved more laterally than when emitter discharges were high. However, in surface drip irrigation small emitter discharges enhanced water to move downward for the same amount of applied volume but the contrary was observed for subsurface irrigation. Likewise, emitters with high discharge rates also favored water to move upwards toward the soil surface but the contrary was observed when applying the same volume of water.